


Five Times Anduin's Leg Was A Problem

by Kitkatkimble



Category: Warcraft - All Media Types, World of Warcraft
Genre: 5+1 Fic, Consequences of Injuries, M/M, literally exactly what it says on the tin
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-14
Updated: 2014-05-14
Packaged: 2018-01-24 18:00:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,115
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1614194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kitkatkimble/pseuds/Kitkatkimble
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>...and one time it wasn't.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five Times Anduin's Leg Was A Problem

1.

The biggest problem with his leg, Anduin thinks, is the obvious. The initial loss of mobility was bad enough – no one enjoys being bedridden, particularly during times as tenuous as these – but the residual limp is enough to drive him crazy.

It’s not even that big an impact. For the most part, he can walk at a reasonable pace, although he does find himself stopping for breaks more often than previously. He’s tenacious enough to push past the pain when need be, a trait that his father fondly refers to as Wrynn Bloody-Mindedness, and while he can’t run, exactly, he can certainly walk pretty quickly.

The problem is simply that even when he had two fully functioning legs, he was often pressed to keep up with the people he spent time around. His height, for one, has always limited his stride, but let’s face it, neither Varian or Jaina is known for their slow pace. Even Wrathion, who he has gotten to known quite well during his recuperation, tends to walk with such purpose that his stride increases and leaves Anduin behind, swearing internally.

“I’m sure the nobles can wait, they’ll still be complaining in a week.”

“I’m sure they will be, Jaina, but the longer I leave them to stab at each others backs, the faster the city will disintegrate into chaos. Plus, I’m wary of leaving the city for too long; it could give our enemies the wrong idea. Anduin can testify to that, can’t you?”

Varian turns, presumably to where he thinks Anduin is following along, just behind him and Jaina as they walk through Lion’s Landing. He looks a little surprised when he’s met with empty air, then looks back to see his son limping along a good ten metres behind them.

“My leg,” Anduin says, grimacing and trying not to look too embarrassed. “I’m sorry. It’s a little difficult to keep up.”

It’s a massive understatement; his leg feels like it’s about to fall off.

Varian’s face clears in understanding, and Jaina looks abashed. “I’m sorry, Anduin,” she says. “We’ll slow down. Do you need to sit?”

He’s sure his face is burning. “I’m alright. Please, don’t hassle yourselves on my account.”

“No, no.” Jaina smiles and meanders back to where Anduin is steadily plodding along. She offers him her arm, and when he looks up at her, she has a knowing twinkle in her eye. It’s only the good humour on her face that makes him accept it.

If she notices how much he’s leaning on her and his cane, she doesn’t mention it.

But at least with Jaina and Varian, there is some degree of sympathy and a willing hand to help him. Not so much with Wrathion.

“Look, it doesn’t matter how incompetent they are, it still doesn’t give you licence to kill them,” he says, desperately trying to keep up with the black dragon. “They are employees, not minions, or slaves. You don’t own their lives.”

“I don’t see the difference,” Wrathion says, deliberately speeding up. Anduin almost whacks him with his cane, but he’s too busy trying not to collapse on the spot. “This is the fifth time. I consider it generous of me to have left it this long.”

“Wrathion!”

Then the bastard starts jogging, and Anduin just drops to the ground and scowls.

 

2.

Anduin knows he’s nothing like his father.

Normally it doesn’t bother him. He doesn’t have to emulate the man to be worthy of the same respect; he’s done his part and more during the various wars he’s seen. Plus, it’s nice to be able to look in the mirror and know he’s looking at his mother’s features, even if there is a hint of Varian in the angle of his brow.

He gets demeaning looks a lot. Sceptical looks, derisive looks, outright hostility. Patronising smirks and dismissive waves. He’s seen it all, and he’s dealt with it with a maturity forced on him despite his years.

But Light damn it, if he gets one more glance at his cane, he is going to snap and Smite someone.

He’s reading a book, minding his own business with his cane propped against his knee, when he looks up long enough to see an entire table of adventurers looking at him with scorn written all over their features. One looks particularly contemptuous; a powerful Orc woman who looks eerily similar to Left.

He raises an eyebrow. He’s gotten rather good at that lately.

She snorts and looks away, but he doesn’t miss the way she rolls her eyes.

He doesn’t know why it bothers him so much. He cares – irrationally so, Wrathion has said before and will say again – about what people think about him, and he cares about what effect he has on them. It’s why following the path of the Light had been such a life changing choice; because he knew, the moment he made that decision, that he would forever be branded by the two, seemingly opposing labels: ‘Varian Wrynn’s son’ and ‘priest’.

Of course, he always knew he would be his father’s son until he managed to evade that particular shadow. It’s the connotations of weakness, of softness, that comes with ‘priest’ that bother him. Priests aren’t weak. Strength comes in many forms, and Anduin isn’t a stranger to different strengths. But many people – warriors and fighters, in particular – have a very single minded view on what strength means and what it means to be a good ruler.

If random strangers think him weak just because of the cane by his side and the Light at his fingertips, surely all he has to do is prove them wrong?

But stopping Garrosh from using the Divine Bell wasn’t enough. All that got him was even more derision and a limp. So what will be enough?

It’s not something he truly wants to know the answer to.

 

3.

“Anduin!”

“Jaina! Hold on!”

He’s half-jogging, half-limping towards where the Archmage is fiercely defending a group of heavily injured paladins. He’s found it easier to heal priests and paladins, because the Light is naturally attuned to them and they seem to soak it up like a sponge – if that makes any sense.

He can hear the sounds of battle all around him. The ringing of steel, the clash of an axe against a shield. He gave up trying to understand what was going on when soldiers started dropping, and hasn’t paid attention since.

Jaina lets out an explosion of energy, which is enough to get him cover towards the group of four. They look up at his approach; two have been stabbed, one is almost comatose, and another seems to have lost nearly half his weight in blood.

Anduin kneels, his knee protesting greatly but his mind overruling it. “I need you all to stay still and calm for me, okay?”

The paladins nod, and not for the first time he blesses soldiers with the common sense to obey orders.

He shuts his eyes and trusts Jaina to keep him safe, and begins to pray fervently. He can feel the Light at his fingertips, thrumming through his veins with the unique sense of fire that he’s never felt from anything else before. It’s heady and intoxicating, but he forces himself to focus and direct it to where it’s needed.

Of course, the Light has other ideas.

It’s been doing this a lot lately. It instinctively flows to the nearest source of pain, the nearest thing in need of healing. Which, of course, is Anduin’s leg.

“No,” he growls, brow furrowing with the effort it takes to redirect the holy energy. “I do not need healing. _Stop._ ”

It takes twice as much effort to cast a healing spell as it usually does; the trouble isn’t so much summoning the Light, especially seeing as Anduin seems naturally predisposed, but manipulating it. Holy energy was not made to be manipulated. It’s about asking, about channelling the power granted. Unlike arcane magic, which the caster themselves has to change and warp.

“Anduin, incoming!”

His concentration is shattered as a spear lodges itself an inch away from his nose. If he hadn’t jerked back when he did, it would have taken his head off.

“No targeting the medics!” one of the paladins shouts in a rich baritone. “Didn’t your mother teach you manners as a child?!”

“Please, you’re only going to irritate your wounds further,” Anduin says. “Now, hold still.”

It’s tiring – exhausting – but he manages. By the time the Alliance soldiers are trawling off the battlefield, he’s leaning heavily against Jaina, laughing a little bit hysterically.

“What good am I if I can’t even heal quickly?” he asks breathlessly. “Wait until my father hears. I’ll never live it down.”

“You know Varian’s not one to say ‘I told you so’.” Jaina has a smile on her face, but there’s something behind her eyes that Anduin doesn’t like.

“Won’t stop him. But I like it when he laughs.” Anduin laughs a little harder at that. “Even if it’s at my expense.”

“Your leg will get better with time,” she assured him. “And you did a spectacular job on the field. You’re easily worth ten medics.”

It’s a nice thought, but that’s all it is.

 

4.

The first time Anduin gets his hands on a bow after the incident with the Divine Bell, he almost cries with happiness. The familiar feel of polished wood and taut string is soothing, comforting, and makes him feel better just by handling it. It’s not his, though, and he hands it back to the adventurer with a smile and a word of thanks. She gives him an odd look, but she’s obviously seen stranger things, as she just turns to continue talking to Wrathion.

Who had, apparently, noticed the exchange and not four hours later is standing outside Anduin’s door, knocking with the impatience that only he could possess.

“Prince Anduin!”

“Yes, yes, I’m coming!” He stands with a sigh and reaches for his cane.

Wrathion is practically bouncing on the balls of his feet, and he shoves a parcel into Anduin’s free hand. “Open it.”

“What are you, two?”

“In _dragon years,_ ” he hisses, following Anduin into the room. “Open it!”

It’s very difficult to say no, particularly when Wrathion looks so childishly excited. So he gingerly unwraps the parcel, and reveals a long, polished bow made with expert hands.

Wrathion smiles smugly. “I knew you’d like it.”

The awe must be showing on his face, then. “I…why?”

The smile widens. “That’s for me to know and you to find out.”

Anduin isn’t even worried by that, despite the ambiguity and lack of originality. He’s too busy running his hands along the wood and feeling around for the bowstring, which had fallen from the packet and become lost against the bed covers.

It’s a little difficult to string it, as his muscles haven’t built up to their former strength, but it feels _good._ The latent strength in the bow seems to invigorate him; he doesn’t know how, or why, but perhaps it has something to do with his history with the weapon.

His joy is halted when he goes out to try and test it out.

He can stand without his cane. He just can’t balance, and he can’t adopt the measured stance needed for archery. He tries futilely for a solid twenty minutes, muscles aching, his leg burning more than he remembers it has before.

“There’s no point,” he says in a low, frustrated voice, dropping down to sit on a nearby bench. “I can’t even stand properly.”

Wrathion just smirks. “I guess it gives you a goal, now, doesn’t it?”

 

5.

Sometimes it creeps up on him. Slowly, tendrils of pain floating up around him, until he can’t bear it and has to shove a fist into his mouth to keep from screaming.

It builds up slowly, you see. It starts light, nothing but a slight twinge that he can easily ignore. So he brushes it off, and keeps doing whatever he’s doing; usually reading, but sometimes walking or playing Jihui with Wrathion. It’s even worse when it’s Jihui, because Wrathion will look at him with such uncharacteristic concern that he just wants to curl into a ball and cry.

Then it progresses to a dull ache, throbbing throughout his leg. He won’t notice until it’s become a severe pain all the way up his side, at which point he usually excuses himself and runs away with what little dignity he has left.

But when it comes at night, when he’s desperately trying to battle insomnia and nightmares, it’s truly terrifying.

He can’t move for pain. The second his leg jars, he’s trapped in agony, his entire body freezing up and his mind short-circuiting from the sudden anguish. He can barely breathe, and it takes all of his effort to keep his chest rising and falling.

It passes, sometimes lightning fast and sometimes slowly. On slower nights, he’ll occasionally wake to Wrathion curled up next to his head, a comforting furnace of warmth. It was incredibly weird the first time, but he was also too blind with pain to care, and sometimes he needs familiarity. Not often, because he doesn’t allow himself the liberty of getting too attached to people anymore, but when he’s on his own in a foreign continent he does get lonely.

“Why don’t you just heal it properly?” Wrathion asks one evening.

“The Light can only do so much,” is his answer, but Wrathion gives him that patented ‘I-am-a-dragon-and-smarter-than-you-now-tell-the-truth’ look and he relents. “I don’t like it. It would take too much energy and there are other things more deserving of it than my leg. It will heal in time.”

By now he knows that’s a lie; it may heal, and it may lose the uncontrollable attacks of pain, but he’ll always walk with a limp. The injury was too severe for anything different.

“I will never understand you, Anduin Wrynn,” the black dragon says, eyes narrowed and shamelessly surveying his form. “You’re practical, if naïve, and yet you do things like this.”

Anduin shrugs. He can’t explain his own actions further than he has, not with pain threatening to break his concentration on the board in front of him. It must show in his expression, and Wrathion sits back and says off-handed, “I’m feeling a little tired. Do you mind if we continue this tomorrow?”

He glances up to sharp eyes watching him, challenging him, and because he is a teenage boy with a certain amount of pride, replies, “Afraid of losing again?”

“I’m afraid that I don’t quite have the patience for dealing with your clumsy attempts at strategy.” There’s nothing but amusement in his tone. “Good night, Anduin.”

“Good night, Wrathion.”

It’s with a relieved sigh that he sinks back into his pillows a few short minutes later.

 

+1.

There is one benefit to Anduin’s leg injury, though…

He’s sitting down in the main floor of the tavern for once, entertaining a few young Pandaren children. He’s always liked kids; there’s something about their happy hope and optimism that just makes him shine a little inside. Wrathion has said that it makes him literally shine as well, but he’s inclined not to believe him.

“Alright, let the Prince have some air,” Tong says, coming up and shooing them away. “I’m sure he’ll have more stories to tell in ten minutes.”

He sits back and stretches his arms, his back cracking as the joints pop. He laughs a little at that, and Tong shoots him a sympathetic look. “Can I trouble you for some tea? My throat’s a little sore from so much talking.”

Tong nods, moving off with a quick pat to the head of the nearest child.

Anduin leans back and closes his eyes, staring at the back of his eyelids intently until the sounds of an argument waft from somewhere across the tavern. He opens them to see a Dwarven shaman arguing passionately with a warlock, who is sitting primly in her chair and frowning.

It looks like the Dwarf has just lost the argument, as he stomps heavily and begins to push his way towards the bar, just near where Anduin is sitting. Unfortunately, his path crosses with that of the Pandaren children, and he nearly trips as one darts in front of his legs.

“Durned kids!” he yells. The child looks up, grins cheekily, then darts past Anduin to the back kitchen.

The Dwarf follows, obviously intent on either giving the little Pandaren either a severe talking to – which Anduin seriously doubts – or a piece of his mind.

He doesn’t make it there.

Subtly, with as much stealth as he can muster, Anduin slides his cane out to catch the Dwarf at his shins just as he runs past. The shaman slams face first into the floor, the impact jarring nearby tables and causing a few flagons of beer to overbalance and collapse onto him.

Before the Dwarf can so much as utter another curse, a menacing looking Blacktalon appears beside him, and in perfectly even and courteous tones says, “May I escort you outside to clear your head?”

It’s not really a question.

Barely thirty seconds after the Dwarf has left the inn, the little Pandaren girl comes up to Anduin and says, “I saw what you did,” in a conspiratorial whisper.

“Did you?” he returns in kind. “I didn’t do anything.”

She giggles and nods, ponytails bobbing. “You tripped him.”

“Alright, you caught me. It can be our little secret.”

She grins and her look turns sharp. “Only if you tell me another story.”

He raises an eyebrow. “Oh, is this blackmail?”

“Two stories.”

“Alright. Two stories. But you have to go find your brother and let him listen too, okay?”

“Fine.”

She slides off his lap and runs off, yelling all the while.

He senses more than sees Wrathion slide up next to him. “We’ll make a rogue out of you, yet,” he says. He has that strange, affectionate tone of voice again; the rare one that makes Anduin’s insides do a strange little jig.  “Very smooth.”

“I’m learning from the best,” he says, nodding his head towards the inconspicuous Blacktalons scattered across the room.

“You’re a regular Knight in Shining Armour, aren’t you?”

“I have to be, if I want to influence you. Opposites, and all that.”

Wrathion’s smirk widens. “Who’s to say you don’t influence me already?”

The look in his eyes makes Anduin blush violently, and it only increases as he leans forward to lightly but purposefully press a kiss to the blond’s lips.

“Well,” says Anduin, “there’s that, too.”

**Author's Note:**

> I regret nothing.


End file.
